"Although violence and the emotional toll it takes can never be wholly accepted, it's come to be expected in places like Peshawar. Insecurity is a shared experience for many in cities across the country; a part of the collective understanding of what it means to be Pakistani. Indeed, resilience has become sort of a national trait. Even as appalling instances of violence take place in America, they are still just that: instances of violence, each one isolated from the next, cast in individual molds. The Boston Marathon bombing is not the Aurora rampage or the Sandy Hook shooting. Indeed, American tragedies are held to American standards of individualism, distinct and rarified. That's precisely what gives their shockwaves such profound resonance, even in places where death and destruction have become a constant lull, ever-ready to erupt into mayhem."
In this article for The American Prospect, I explore the difference between ruthless assaults on innocent life in Pakistan and in the US. In the former, violence seems to be a part of a far-reaching social network, while attacks on American soil, I argue, seem to be rooted in the country's unbridled individualism. Click here to read the full piece.